Brick fields and tile kilns

The view north from Maiden Lane bridge
in 1835 (E.H.Dixon, 1835, courtesy of Islington Local History Centre) shows fields and market gardens stretching up to Holloway, with
a large mansion, Copenhagen House, on the crest of the hill. The land slopes
east to west down to the valley of the River Fleet. The property boundary of Counsellor
Agar, who fought protracted legal battles with the Regent’s Canal Company over
the canal alignment, is clearly marked by the wood. It includes a parcel of
land reached via Somers Bridge (a little further to the west), rural tracks
connecting this parcel with Elm Lodge, his mansion.

But the features are not all rural. Large areas had been let for brickmaking from
1808. The first track off
Maiden Lane to the east was William Street, now Copenhagen Street. Beyond that
is the nearer pair of tile kilns, Randall’s kilns, which moved from Battle
Bridge in 1828 as London expanded. The northern pair of tile kilns, Adam’s
kilns, is at Belle Isle, where modern day Tileyard Road (formerly Tile Kilns
Road) recalls their presence.Between the two pairs of kilns and their
associated settlements of houses, can be seen the ‘4 acre field’ that is being
excavated to extract brick earth and clay for brick and tile making.

With the opening of the Regent's Canal,
industry was already competing to spread into the nearby fields. Small
settlements had grown up on the east side of Maiden Lane based on brick making,
in parts of what is now Barnsbury, as early as Elizabethan times. Stone was
always expensive in London as it had to be imported from a distance. Wooden
buildings had been outlawed since the Great Fire, which massively increased the
demand for bricks. The rapid growth of the city placed a heavy demand on
building materials. Fortunately, London had suitable clay in abundance. The
Thames flood plain is overlain by a geological formation known generally as ‘brick
earth’, and this weathered material,
rather than the intractable London clay, provided the basis for the ubiquitous
stock brick from which much of Victorian London was built. Brick earth seams
were shallow, no more than 5-6 feet (1.5-1.8 m) deep, and hence were used up
quickly.

Brick manufacture involved digging
up fields for the brick earth beneath and then firing the slabs in tall
purpose-built kilns. These structures rose dramatically against the
skyline, attracting artists, but polluting the environment. The area around
Battle Bridge and north to Belle Isle was conveniently close to the City but
far enough away for land to be cheaper and the environmental degradation less evident.
It was ideal for brick and tile manufacture until nearby residential
development made these activities increasingly unpopular.

Workmen in the brickmaking trade invariably worked by the piece, labouring
sometimes from three in the morning till nine at night in the height of summer.
They could earn extravagant wages, sometimes three or four guineas a week,
which they would spend as extravagantly in one of the many local public houses.
They were often reduced to dismal straits in the winter, when they could not
work.